VA official acknowledges failures at Tomah VA

Sloan D. Gibson, deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, calls for an atmosphere of openness and transparency as he responds to questions from Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson.(Photo: Rick Wood/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

TOMAH - A top Veterans Affairs official testified Monday that his department acknowledged its failures at the troubled Tomah VA Medical Center and is working to prevent similar breaches in the future.

"More than anything else this is a leadership failure," Sloan Gibson, VA deputy secretary, told a U.S. Senate field hearing.

"There's lots of finger-pointing," Gibson said. "At the end of the day, we own this. We've had ample opportunity over a period of years to fix this. That's leadership's responsibility. We failed to get it done."

Gibson's testimony came after a committee headed by U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson released a Republican majority report that found "systemic failures" involving VA watchdogs who conducted a multi-year investigation of the facility.

"Allegations of drug diversion, opioid over-prescription, retaliation and mismanagement festered," said the report from the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs. "As a result, veterans died."

A "culture of fear" permeated the facility, the report said. Tomah VA officials at the center of the problem have been fired, including former director Mario DeSanctis and chief of staff, David Houlihan, dubbed by some as the "Candy Man" for freely dispensing prescriptions.

The 359-page document zeroed in on previous investigations and uncovered new details involving over prescription of medications at the facility, which became known as "Candy Land."

"We've held people accountable, which is somewhat unusual in the federal government," Johnson, a Republican from Oshkosh, said in remarks to the news media at Cranberry Country Lodge, site of the hearing.

"It's my responsibility to be the watchdog of the watchdog," Johnson added.

Johnson said the VA's Office of Inspector General was "loyal to the agency" instead of the veterans who were under care. He said the office needs to clean house but he lauded the newly-installed inspector general, Michael Missal, who testified at the hearing.

Johnson is in a tight political race against former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, a Democrat who lost the seat in 2010. Johnson said he has not politicized the issue. But the Tomah tragedy has erupted in the campaign, with outside groups pouring in money for ads accusing the candidates of failing to act promptly to root out the problems.

"The bottom line of what this report shows is it was the failure of the Office of Inspector General and the failure of other agencies and offices to actually highlight the problems they were made aware of that allowed these tragedies to occur," Johnson said in his opening statement.

U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, a Democrat from Madison, said "we will continue to work across the partisan aisle in order to address the problems at the Tomah VA. In fact, I would describe it as, there is no aisle."

Among those who attended the hearing was the family of Marine Corps veteran Jason Simcakoski, who died at the Tomah facility in Aug. 2014 as a result of "mixed drug toxicity."

Marvin Simcakoski, who after his son's death emerged as an advocate for better patient care for veterans, said: "What we heard here is good. They're trying to do things that are right. Theye're trying to help the veterans in the long run here ... I think the outlook is favorable for positive change."